


In The Drift

by ADreamingSongbird



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Pacific Rim AU, ed and al are drift compatible, feat. cameos of Ling Lan Fan and Riza, kaiju are assholes and Things Go Wrong but there's a happy ending ok
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-25
Updated: 2015-12-25
Packaged: 2018-05-09 05:13:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5526734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ADreamingSongbird/pseuds/ADreamingSongbird
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Edward and his brother Alphonse are the proud pilots of the jaeger Fullmetal.  One blustery autumn, a kaiju manages to take them down - what follows are several weeks of fretting, healing and disillusionment at being stuck on the ground.  And also, possibly, Edward sorting out his awkward crush on their mechanic and childhood best friend, Winry.  It should be an adventure...</p>
            </blockquote>





	In The Drift

 “Al!”

“I know, I know, I’m on it!”

Klaxons blare loudly in the back of his head.  Some part of him thinks irritably that they’re kind of distracting and annoying and for god’s sake he _knows_ they’re in deep shit, there’s two kaiju out there versus their one jaeger, and said jaeger is not in the best of conditions (read: the right arm hurts like hell and the left leg is kind of maybe about to fall off if it takes any more direct hits? Ha ha, this sucks), but the majority of his brain is focused on getting them the hell out of here alive.

“Oi, Bastard, anyone up there, I don’t know who’s listening, but we need backup!  We need backup, now!”

“Brother,” Al’s voice—strangely soft; he would never have heard it if Al wasn’t in his head too—gets his attention.  “I don’t know if backup will make it in time.”

“You stop that talk,” he snaps, letting his own desperate frustration fight off his little brother’s growing sense of despair. “We’re going to get out of here and be _fine_ , now—“

“Duck!” Al yelps, cutting him off.  It’s not entirely necessary, because as soon as Al saw the monster running at them on the right Ed knew it, too, but it takes effort to stop those innate reactions like yelling out a warning; brains are meant to be alone, not joined.  But theirs _are_ joined, and they both immediately drop into a crouch, feeling the sudden huge _whoosh_ of acceleration as their jaeger’s head plummets a few stories, and the blow that might have taken their head clean off its shoulders sails by harmlessly above them.

Crackly static comes in from the receiver.  _“—you copy?  Fullmetal, come in.  Alphonse!  Edward!  Are you there?”_

“Yeah, for a little longer at least!” Edward yells at it.  The kaiju roars in pain as he and Al ram their right fist into its side with massive force, sending it crashing down into the water.  That won’t be the last of it; that only bought them a few seconds.

“Please tell me you’re sending out _someone_ ,” Al begs.  “Cold Steel?  Dragon’s Pulse?  Anyone?”

_“Dragon’s Pulse is on its way,”_ Lieutenant Hawkeye’s voice confirms.  _“Hang in there, you two, just a little longer!”_

“We’re _trying!_ ” Edward hisses.  He almost adds _if anything happens to my little brother I’ll kill you guys_ , but he doesn’t have to.  Everyone knows that.  (He catches a little bit of an affectionate thought from Al, one that’s buried under layers of stress, a tad of fear, and frantic planning of their options, and smiles grimly.  Whether he’s smiling for Al or to himself, he’s not sure.)

There’s a telltale surge in the water a second before the kaiju comes surging up again with a roar as its long tail swings in tandem with one of its arms, landing a painfully solid blow to their left knee.  With an awful scraping scream of metal grating against metal, the joint gives way, and in a moment that’s both horrifyingly slow and quicker than the blink of an eye, their left knee snaps backwards, out of place in a way that knees are definitely not meant to bend. Their harnesses echo the motion, Alphonse’s more closely than Edward’s since Edward pilots the right hemisphere.  Ed cries out, but what hurts far more is the agonized shriek wrenched from his brother’s throat at his left.

“Fucking hell!” he yells as Al lets out another pained cry, disoriented.  Fullmetal’s right arm deploys its sword again, and with the help of the elbow rockets, rams it straight through the kaiju’s skull while it’s still trying to twist off their left leg.  There’s no time for it to run, though it roars when it sees the blade coming.  And once it’s lodged, it’s game over.  It twitches, spasms, and with a great splash, collapses back into the ocean.

One down.  One to go.  Alright.

Now... where the fuck is it?

“Al,” he gasps, not tearing his gaze from the horizon as he scans for signs of movement.  He desperately wants to look over, to gauge for himself how bad the damage is, but he knows the second he’s distracted will be the second the damn kaiju appears.  “Talk to me.  You okay?”

“I—augh—I’m pretty sure ... pretty sure my leg’s broken,” Alphonse manages.  “Don’t worry about me, though.”  _Worry about that other kaiju_ , he doesn’t say, but Edward hears it anyway.

“Don’t tell me what to do, I’m the older brother,” he answers as lightly as he can given the circumstances. 

Movement catches his eye then, but to his immense relief it’s helicopters and lights and oh thank fucking god that’s Dragon’s Pulse.  Finally.

_“Hey, Fullmetal,”_ Ling’s voice greets over the coms as the second metal behemoth drops into the ocean with a colossal splash.  _“I hope you guys don’t mind us joining the party.”_

“Nah, it’s nice of you to show up at all,” Edward replies.  “Too bad you missed half the fun!”

Before either Ling or Lan Fan can answer that, the other “partygoer” appears, a huge, tall blue abomination rearing its head out of the waves.  “Kaiju behind you!” Al calls out a warning to Dragon’s Pulse at the same time as Edward yells “Ugly at six o’clock!”

Dragon’s Pulse wheels around with speed surprising for its size—Edward recalls Winry excitedly talking about its increased agility compared to older models like Fullmetal, which sacrificed the opportunity to jump around and be quick in order to increase their sheer power—and starts charging its plasma cannon.  Edward cautiously lets out a breath.

Then the kaiju goes underwater again.

_“Where’d he go?”_ Ling wonders aloud.  The helicopter lights sweep the dark ocean, to no avail; Edward tenses, scanning the water surface for signs of blue.

_“Fullmetal, look out behind—_ “

Lan Fan’s panicked cry is the last thing he hears before there’s a sudden burst of _agony_ in his chest.  He thinks he might be screaming, and he thinks he hears Al scream too, but honestly with his blood roaring in his ears and with waves of red hot pain pain pain rolling through him like a tsunami crashing through a coastal village, he isn’t all that sure.  All he knows is that when it fades, he notices two things:

One, Al is still screaming.  This is probably because now that Edward, in shock and pain himself, looks at him, he can see that his leg has broken badly enough that there’s blood pouring out of a wound where there’s a bit of white bone poking out.

Two, that wound is hard to see, because the lights are flickering.

And then they go out.

Well, Edward thinks, _fuck_.

In the sudden darkness, he stumbles and nearly falls from his harness; the power’s gone, and with it so is the Drift.  The sudden emptiness in his mind is unnerving out here, still in the jaeger, in the darkness of the cockpit.  Next to him he hears Al’s screams slowly die down into whimpers that fade into ragged gasps.

“Al,” he says shakily. “Al?”

“What—what happened,” his little brother forces out through clenched teeth.  Edward wants to reach for him, either physically or mentally, but neither option works right now, and he’s forced to remain as he is.

“Not sure,” he answers.  “I think the bastard got us right in the power core.  We’re dead in the water.”

“Oh,” Al says, taking a deep breath.  He lets it out again, shakily.  “Shit.”

“Yeah,” Ed agrees bleakly.  “Sums it up pretty well.”

A few moments pass; it might be seconds, or maybe minutes, he’s not sure.  Eventually, his head stops spinning and he can breathe against the pain that’s still radiating from his chest, where the kaiju rammed them.  Or maybe stabbed them; some of them have some damn sharp spines.  A stab would make sense, if it took out the power.  _Hah, Winry’s gonna love that._   But that’s a thought for later.  He pushes it away and focuses on the now.

With a barely-stifled groan, Edward reaches up with his aching right arm—it nearly got torn off at one point, and he’s pretty sure that if it’d been any longer before Al got the plasma cannon out, it would have definitely been, and that would have hurt like _hell_ —and disables the harness, sliding to the floor and taking a second to just stand there, getting his bearings.  As his eyes adjust to the dimness he peers out through the front visor for a second, but the fight’s behind them, where he presumes Dragon’s Pulse is taking on the damn kaiju that did this.  There’s nothing to see out there.

He turns his attention back to Alphonse.

Carefully walking over, he notes with dismay the gathering little puddle of blood under Al’s harness as he reaches up to disable it, too.  “Hey,” he mutters as Al lets out a choked, pained whimper.  “Hey, c’mere,” as he guides Al down from the straps into his arms; his knees nearly buckle but he forces himself to remain upright, holding Al up.  Al leans heavily against him and even in the low light Edward can see he’s struggling not to cry; the stray tear that leaks out and courses down his cheek is like another punch to the gut, reminding him that god, Al’s only eighteen, has only been out here for a year.  Granted, he himself is only nineteen and has also only been in the jaeger program for a year, but... this is his little brother.

“Brother,” Al gasps, “what, what are we, what are we supposed to do now?”

“C’mon,” Ed answers, sliding his arm under Al’s and around his back to support him more evenly. “Lean on me, let’s get out of the cockpit.  We can use the flare and the helicopters will pick us up.”

The words _if the kaiju doesn’t get us first_ go unspoken.  But even now, when they aren’t in the Drift, he’s pretty sure his brother hears it anyway.

“Right,” Al agrees.  Together, they slowly hobble their way to the wall panel and get the flare gun; Al holds it in one hand while Ed uses both of his arms to keep him upright.  The stairs outside the cockpit leading up to the hatch prove to be a bit of a challenge, though, because they’re narrow and steep and almost but not quite a ladder.  Finally, Edward grits his teeth and lifts Alphonse up on his back, like they’re five and six again and he’s just giving his little brother a piggyback ride around the house, and ignoring his pain and Al’s (which is significantly harder) he climbs as fast as he can.

“Can you push the hatch open?” he asks raggedly, craning his neck to look up at Al in the dimness.  “I can’t do it without putting you down.”

“Yeah, I think so.  Let me just...” Trailing off, Alphonse twists the handle and weakly shoves at the hatch.  It swings a bit and then falls back into place; he pushes it again, but harder, and manages to get it to stay open.  This accomplished, he sags back against Edward, who climbs out as quickly as he can.

“Hey, Al, hang in there,” he says anxiously, grasping for the flare gun as Al passes it to him with fumbling fingers. “We’re gonna be okay.”

The sea breeze brings with it a welcome chill after all their exertion.  He presses Al close and takes a deep breath of it, feels it whipping through his hair as they stand on top of their immobilized jaeger, towering high above the waves.

A deep, low crash sounds behind them, and he quickly turns in time to see Dragon’s Pulse pulling its arm back to aim another punch at the kaiju’s gut.  It dodges this one and rams Dragon’s Pulse’s shoulder; the jaeger rocks in place but doesn’t fall.  Edward and Alphonse watch for a few seconds longer, but then Edward remembers why they’re standing out here and raises his arm.  The second the kaiju faces away from them, he fires, and a single red flare launches high up into the sky.

“Well,” he says, letting out a breath, and letting the gun clatter to the deck, “that’s done.  Now we just wait a bit.”  He pulls Al a bit closer and rests his chin atop his head, absurdly wanting to rock him back and forth like he’s trying to soothe a child.  He doesn’t do that, though, because he’s pretty sure he’ll fall over if he tries, and that would definitely make Al’s leg worse.

“Yeah,” Al agrees weakly.   Something in his voice sounds off, far away, too distant, as he waits a moment and then echoes, “Waiting.  Oh... hey, Brother...?”

Even though they aren’t in the Drift anymore, somehow Ed knows to tighten his arms an instant before his little brother collapses.

~

The door bursts open.

“Al!  I wish I could have come sooner, but they needed me in the repair bay, and—oh, anyway, how are you?”

Winry runs into the room, questions already tumbling from her mouth before she skids to a stop, blue eyes going wide as she realizes her mistake.

“Shush,” Edward tells her, entirely too late but still wanting the stupid satisfaction of having said it. “He’s not exactly awake.”

“Is—is he okay?”  She inches forward uncertainly, stepping to the edge of the bed and reaching for Al’s hand before she stops and withdraws.  Edward is a bit confused before he sees her wiping a spot of dark engine grease from her fingers onto her shirt and shakes his head, then turns his attention back to Al.

“Yeah,” he says, leaning forward and using his left hand to gently smooth some stray strands of honey-golden hair from his brother’s forehead.  “He’s more or less just asleep.  It, uh, broke his leg, pretty bad, and after he stopped running on adrenaline enough to finish the fight he went out.  Doctors said it was a combination of blood loss and shock.”

“Blood loss?” Winry repeats, coming around the bed to stand behind his chair.  She looks down at Al, biting her lip anxiously.  “Where was he losing blood from?”

“Broken leg, I just said,” Ed repeats, a hint of mild irritation seeping into his voice.  “Broken leg where a bit of his bone stabbed through his leg and started bleeding everywhere.  Like I said, pretty bad.”

“Oh,” she whispers.  When he glances up at her, her face has gone pale.  Then her hand comes to rest on his shoulder, but it’s his sore, bruised right shoulder and he flinches away from the touch, shaking her off quickly.  She drops her hand back to her side.

A silence falls between them for a long moment, punctuated only by the soft sound of Al’s slow breaths and the ticking of the clock on the wall.  Edward doesn’t look up again.  He’s somewhat terrified that if he does, he’ll see tears glistening in her eyes, maybe even falling down her cheeks, and god dammit he doesn’t want to see that, not now.  Not ever, really, but _especially_ not now.

He breaks the silence, still staring at his little brother’s closed eyes.  “What, you’re not gonna yell at me about breaking the jaeger?  That’s gotta be a first, huh?”

“Shut up!” Winry smacks the back of his head.  “I _could_ , but then I’d just have to yell at him too, so I might as well save it for when you’re _both_ awake, right, dummy?”

He figures it’s best to ignore that quaver in her voice there.  “Yeah, sure, just procrastinate on it.  Well, I’m not complaining, you take all the time you want, Miss Gearhead.”

“I will!”

“Good!”

“Argh!”  Winry stamps her foot.  “Why are you so—so—why are you always like this?  What, no one else is allowed to be worried about him?  It’s not like all I ever do is yell at you about breaking Fullmetal!  In case you didn’t notice, you’re not the only person in the world who cares about Al!  You don’t have to sit there and act like you’re fine because no one else would get it!  We can drop this whole act for once and just—just—”

“Just _what_?”  Edward does his best to keep his voice flat and kind of cynical.  He isn’t _acting_ like he’s fine, he knows Al will be okay, the doctors said so!

“Just sit here, together, and watch over him,” she finishes, more quietly.  “I know it’s normal for us to be arguing over stupid things, but Ed... this,” she waves a hand at Al’s still form, “this isn’t normal.”

“Tch.”  He snorts disparagingly.  Winry’s just making a bigger deal out of it than it has to be.  Al’s going to be _fine_ and she needs to stop worrying—isn’t he worrying enough for both of them?  And for no reason, because he’s going to be fine!—because if he had to be honest he’d admit that he _hates_ worrying her.

He scoots over on the chair, to his right, and waits.

“Well?”

“Well what?” she frowns.

“Are you gonna sit with me and keep an eye on him or not?”

After a moment of surprised silence, she plops down next to him.  It’s a bit of a tight squeeze, and they’re squished together between the armrests, but it works.  Winry’s hand finds its way into his, quietly, and he twines his fingers around hers, just as silent.  His other hand remains where it is, gently holding Al’s, partly because he’s not letting go of his little brother and partly because his right arm hurts to move, anyway.

“What about you?” Winry asks after a long moment.  Not an awkward or tense one, though; just a still one.  “Are you hurt, too?”

“Just a strained muscle in my leg,” he brushes off her concern with as much nonchalance as he can muster.  “And a kind of bruised shoulder.  I’m sure you saw the state of Fullmetal’s arm.”

“I did,” she agrees a bit tartly. “It’s why I asked.  Are you sure it’s just a bruise?  That looked worse than just a bruise.”

“Okay, so maybe it’s a really bad bruise and another pulled muscle,” he amends a bit sheepishly.  Sometimes he forgets that the gearhead is also the daughter of two doctors.  And that she knows him too well.

“Hm.”  Winry gives him a disapproving look, then softens as her gaze slides back to Al.  She doesn’t say anything for a moment, sighing and looking around the room as if seeking something to ease her worries. 

Then her eyes settle on the bedside table, and the object sitting there.  They narrow. 

“Edward... what’s this doing here?”  She leans away from him to pick up the ice pack that the doctors told him to keep on his shoulder to help keep swelling down.  “I’m pretty sure it isn’t supposed to be on the table, you idiot!”

“Hey, hey, my other arm got tired, and it was cold, and I didn’t want to keep just sitting there holding it—“

“ _Honestly_ , you boys are going to be the death of me, can’t do _anything_ yourselves!”  She shakes her head sternly and lets go of Ed’s hand (if he feels a pang of disappointment at that, he doesn’t show it) to take the pack.  Then she snakes her arm around him to hold it against his right shoulder; he lets out a hiss that’s mostly shock thanks to the sudden cold.

“Augh!  Winry, what the—“

“No, none of that!” she lectures, wagging her finger at him.  “If you won’t hold it up, then I’ll have to hold it for you, and you’ll just have to sit here and let me!  I’m sick of sitting around watching you guys get hurt, so the least you can do to make it up to me is let me take care of you when you’re too stubborn to do it yourself!”

He ... _should_ be able to argue with that, but right now, for some reason, he can’t find the words.  Maybe it’s because the cold is numbing the pain and that actually feels pretty good, wow.

“Yeah... okay, whatever,” he grumbles instead, and closes his eyes.  Winry hums triumphantly.

The next morning, he wakes up to a stiff neck from sleeping in the chair all night long and a bag of water on the floor under Winry’s hand, which has gone limp because she’s asleep in the chair too, her head cozily nestled against his shoulder.  And Al is awake, just smiling at both of them like he knows something they don’t, and even though damn his neck and shoulders and back hurt, he feels like this is right.

~

“—I mean, I’m sure you know what you’re doing, Brother, but you can’t even give me a little estimate or some sort of reassurance that you actually know what you’re doing?”

“Al.”

“Because last time I was in your head, I _definitely_ got the impression that you have no idea what you’re doing—“

“ _Al._ ”

“—and I would never doubt you and your great master planning skills, _obviously_ , but c’mon, Brother, is it really that hard?  All you have to do is—”

“Alphonse Elric, I’m gonna put the brakes on this wheelchair and leave you outside in the rain without an umbrella and lock the door.  But before I leave you, I _know_ where you’re ticklish.  So if you don’t shut up _right now_ —“

“Brother!  You wouldn’t do that, that’s so mean!  I could still get in but it’s _cold_ out there!”

“Try me.”  Edward folds his arms across his chest and frowns down at Al, trying to ignore the way he can feel his cheeks burning.  Christ, his face is probably the same shade as his hoodie now, which is to say scarlet.  Dammit, Alphonse.

In the chair, Alphonse laughs, absolutely unrepentant as Ed starts pushing him again.  “You _always_ try and make some excuse or other to change the subject!  You’re just scared, admit it, you can get into a giant robot and fight giant sea alien monsters but when it comes to your love life?”

“I said, shut up!” Ed hisses.  “And it’s _Winry!_   Why wouldn’t I be scared?  She might throw a damn wrench at me or something!”

“She wouldn’t,” Al says confidently.  He seems way more confident than Edward, which is kind of annoying, because it’s not even his love life at stake here.  Ed flicks the side of his little brother’s head.

“Yeah, well, you can lecture me about this after you sort out whatever’s going on with _you and May_ ,” he says pointedly, letting his voice slide into a Big Brother’s Trademarked “Teasing Asshole” tone.

“There isn’t anything going on with me and May!” Al protests.  “You’ve been in my head, so you know that’s true, we’re just good friends!”

It’s technically true, at least as far as things go right now.  He’s seen the way May looks at his little brother, though, and... Hah.  _Just good friends_ indeed.  Edward considers teasing him about it further, but just as he opens his mouth to do so, Al jumps back into the conversation.

“And you’re doing it again!  Changing the subject!  Nope, it won’t work!  You can’t fool me, I know you too well, Brother.”  He twists around in the chair to peer up at Edward triumphantly, grinning.  “I bet you can’t give me _one_ good reason not to tell her.  Not even one!”

“I already gave you one, but if you’re gonna just shoot down every single good reason I give you, obviously you’ll say I don’t have any good reasons!” Ed complains.  “That’s not my fault, that’s you having unfair rules.  If you’re gonna make it a challenge, you should do it more fairly, so that you don’t get to arbitrarily decide what’s a good reason and what isn’t.  In fact—“

“You’re changing the subject _again_ ,” Alphonse points out.  He’s taking far, far too much delight in this conversation, and if he wasn’t already in a wheelchair with a giant cast on his leg, Edward would be at least slightly tempted to shove him into a bush.  The temptation only grows when Al grins even more widely and says, “Just tell her!  It’ll be fine!”

“No, it won’t,” Edward grumps at him. “Shut up.”

Al rolls his eyes and shakes his head, laughing.  Then he dramatically flops against the backrest of his chair.  “But, Brother, my leg is killing me, I’m not going to make it!  Won’t you grant your dying brother’s last wish?”

“Al, that’s not funny!”  Edward lightly smacks his shoulder.  “Don’t joke about that kind of thing, you dumbass!”

“It was a pun!” the other boy defends.  “Because, you know, my leg is _killing_ me?”

“It’s hurting again now?”  Joking is put aside in favor of concern; he leans down anxiously, peering first at the cast as if it’ll give him answers before his questioning gaze turns to Al’s face.  They’re on their way from the medical wing back to the pilot dormitories now, heading back to their apartment after Al’s most recent check-up.  He’s healing fine and the general painkillers the doctors (including a certain Chinese medical student girl, wink wink) gave him should have already kicked in and definitely shouldn’t have worn off yet, but if they need to turn around...

“No, not as much,” Al shakes his head, waving a hand as if to physically dispel Ed’s worries.  “Kind of, but no more than usual.  Which means it isn’t really a lot.”

“Oookay.”  Edward isn’t entirely satisfied, but that answer will do.  He knows Al will tell him if it’s really bad, or at least he’d better, if he knows what’s good for him. “If you say so.  Anyway, wanna swing by the cafeteria before we go home, or do you just wanna go straight there?”

“Food, please!  I’m hungry.”

“Right.  Food it is.”

He takes a right at the junction of the next hallway and promptly nearly runs his brother over a startled Winry Rockbell, who lets out a startled yelp and jumps aside just as Al yips in surprise and Edward yanks the wheelchair backwards to avoid hitting her.

“Hey!  Watch it!” she scolds, frowning at Edward as her hands settle on her hips.

“Well _excuse me_ for being unable to see around corners,” he snarks back. 

“Hey, Brother,” Al starts in a sing-song voice.  Without looking down Edward smacks a hand down on top of his head, too hard to be considered a pat but too soft to really be called a hit.

“Shut it,” he says without missing a beat.  “Or I _will_ leave you at the bottom of the stairs and get food on my own.”

“Edward!” Winry reprimands.

“I didn’t _mean_ it!” he protests, raising his hands defensively because she’s wearing her tool belt and that combined with reprimands usually always means bad things.  Specifically, bad things in the form of a wrench sometimes thrown at his head.  So maybe Bad Things, with capital letters.  “I’m just saying shit to make him shut up, he knows that!  Besides, there are elevators!”

“Yup!” Al agrees cheerfully. “So I know I don’t actually have to shut up.  Don’t worry, Winry, you know he’s too much of a softy to actually follow through on threats like that!”

“Al, I swear, I might not leave you at the bottom of the stairs but if you think for a _second_ I don’t know where you’re ticklish or I won’t use that information to my advantage, you’re so wrong.  That’s practically my _right_ , as your big brother!”  Edward folds his arms smugly.  He has the advantage now.  Al won’t _dare_ try to make any awful matchmaker comments, right?

“Wiinnn-ryyyy,” Alphonse wheedles instead, plaintively reaching a hand out to her.  “I can’t chase him down, but you know where _he’s_ ticklish, don’t you?  If you don’t I can tell you!”

Winry stares from one brother to the other, her eyebrows rising.  “Are you two trying to get me to take sides here?”

“No,” Al the innocent says quickly.

“Yes,” Edward accuses simultaneously.

“Maybe,” Al admits, sheepish.  “Kind of.”

“You are,” Edward tells him, then looks back at Winry.  “He is.  Don’t listen to him.”

Winry glances between the two of them again, her lips twitching.  “I might have forgotten where,” she says then, and Edward feels his stomach drop.  “Refresh my memory, Al?”

Oh no.

“His neck, especially under his jaw, and also he’s very ticklish around his middle and his sides,” says his entirely too gleeful little brother.  How is Al so giddy as he knowingly seals Ed’s doom?

“Neck, middle, and sides,” Winry repeats, eyeing Edward in a way that makes him swallow hard.  Her eyes sweep up and down appraisingly and he has an odd feeling he’s blushing again and god _dammit_ this is definitely not the time for thinking about how he kind of wants to kiss her, what is his brain doing?  This is a time to be formulating escape plans and ways to get revenge on Al, not imagining tickle fights with Winry.

Tickle fights with Winry...

Oh, god, he is so very screwed.  He’s never going to say it out loud but Al’s definitely right.  He’s so screwed and he really needs to just strap some steel to his spine already and tell her.

“Uh... anyway... we’re... on our way to get dinner,” he hears himself saying awkwardly, to change the subject.  “Wanna join?  That is, if you’re done discussing things you _really_ need to shut up about,” he adds, directing that last bit at his brother, who grins unrepentantly.

“I already ate,” she says apologetically, but instead of shaking her head and walking away, she tilts it and taps her chin thoughtfully.  “Although... the lemon bars on the dessert table were really good.  I’ll come sit with you and just have another one of those!”

“Sounds great!” Al chirps.  Edward ruffles his hair so that it all gets in his eyes and then resumes pushing the wheelchair towards the cafeteria, Winry falling into step at his side.

When they’ve gotten their food, Ed hands his tray to Al so he can push the chair over to the table where they join May, Ling, and Lan Fan.  Winry’s already sitting there, chattering eagerly to Lan Fan about her latest idea for an upgrade to Dragon’s Pulse’s arm blades, while Ling is attempting to stealthily swipe a fry from May’s plate.  She notices and smacks his wrist with her fork.

“Hi, guys!” Al greets as Edward pushes him up to the table and then steps aside to take the empty seat next to Winry. 

“Hey!” Ling responds.  “How’s the leg?”

“Well, unfortunately I’m pretty sure it’s still broken,” Al jokes.  Ling laughs, Winry snorts, and May rolls her eyes and shakes her head, apparently finding the joke either stupid or in bad taste.  Edward is kind of inclined to agree with her, even though he’s not sure which of the two it is, but that might just be because he’s still a little bit mad at Al for that betrayal about ticklishness.

“How long is it until you two can drift again?” Lan Fan inquires, looking over from Winry’s other side.  Al, who has just put a spoonful of rice in his mouth, glances helplessly at his brother.

“A while,” Ed answers for him, stabbing a piece of broccoli with his fork.  “It’s still about a month or so before he gets to the crutches.”

“Open tibial shaft fractures usually take a long time to heal,” May adds.  “But at least you’ll have your ankle and foot mobilized next week, if all goes well!”

“Can’t wait,” Al says fervently, then sighs.  “I can’t wait til I get to walk again, actually.”

“Damn those kaiju, huh,” Ling says sympathetically.  Edward recalls how a few months ago Ling’s hand was broken when Dragon’s Pulse’s hand cannon was ripped clean off—not as bad as Al’s broken leg, in his opinion, but still pretty bad.

“Yeah,” Al agrees.

“Speaking of kaiju, what do you think of the frequency of the attacks recently?” Lan Fan looks around the table, her eyebrows raised and concern apparent in her eyes, especially when she looks across at Ling.  “It’s an alarming trend.”

“There has to be a way to stop them,” Winry muses, staring off into the distance almost dreamily; Edward can see the gears turning in her head.  The thing is, she’s trying to engineer a solution to a problem they don’t even know the full parameters of.  It’s infuriating, but no one knows how to study the Breach without, y’know, getting kaiju’d.

He pushes some peas around on his plate moodily.  “Well, we’ve _tried_ dropping bombs on it.  Didn’t really work.”

“So obviously, something about just dropping a bomb isn’t right,” she says in that voice that’s not one-hundred-percent here.  There are probably blueprints and schematics of the ocean floor going through her head, he thinks with something between ridicule and admiration.  “And I guess that makes sense, right?”

“Why does that make sense?” Al asks.  “The Breach is the connection between our worlds.  Shouldn’t that mean things we send should go through, same as things they do?”

“Well obviously they _don’t_ ,” May points out.  “You know what I think?  I think it might be a one-way gate.  Because, I mean, _we_ didn’t open it, _they_ did.  At the very least, either they opened it or it was random chance that really worked out for them, but that still seems an awful lot like they might have influenced it, don’t you think?”

“Maybe,” Edward says, frowning, “but that doesn’t make sense.  If it was me in control of sending my guys to invade a planet and kill people, I wouldn’t leave them there without a way of getting home.  That would be stupid, there’d be no point to that.  So there’s gotta be a way of getting back through the Breach.  We just haven’t found it yet.”

“Well, I’m sure they’ve had this discussion plenty of times over in the science block,” Lan Fan says, pushing her chair back and standing.  “All we know for sure is that when those bastards show up, we blow them out of the water and protect our own.”

Ling mirrors her, pushing himself to his feet in a fluid motion whose grace is robbed by the way he leans over and snags a final fry from Al’s plate, popping it in his mouth.  “Yup!” he says. “We’re gonna call it an early night—I finally convinced her to try watching Korean soap operas with me and tonight’s the night for it.  See you guys tomorrow!”

“I’ll let you know how terrible of a decision this was then,” Lan Fan says with a hint of a wry smile.

She and Ling walk away, leaving Ed sitting with Al, May, and Winry.  The four of them look around and eat and sit in silence for a minute, before Al finally speaks up.

“So, May,” he says with a smile.  “How’s your day going?”

May smiles back sunnily, and Edward can practically see the hearts in her eyes.  _How_ is Al this oblivious, exactly?

“Pretty tiring,” she says with a little laugh. “Honestly?  Calling it an early night, even to watch Korean soap operas, sounds pretty good.  I spent most of the day on my feet watching the doctors in the operating room today.  It was very interesting, though!”

Al wrinkles his nose. “Well, I’m glad you had fun with that,” he says wryly.  “I’m _not_ so sure that it’s what I’d call great table talk, though.”

“We can always go back to Korean soap operas if you’d like,” Winry teases.

“Or we could even do something crazy, like talk about movies and shows that _aren’t_ pure shit,” Ed adds.

“Well, I dunno about you guys, but _I’m_ here for settling down to watch a movie tonight,” Al says, glancing at May before dropping his gaze to his mashed potatoes as if nobody saw that.  Ed exchanges a knowing look with Winry and smirks to himself.

“Me too,” the Chinese girl says, not looking at Al.  “Something lighthearted and fun, I think.”

“That sounds good,” Al says, then takes the plunge.  “Hey, May, after dinner do you wanna just do that?  I mean, sit down and find a movie to watch?  I don’t have any specific one in mind, but we could browse Netflix or something...”

“Oh yes of course!” May answers eagerly before he’s even finished talking, her hands flying up to clasp under her chin as her words tumble out in a rush.  “That sounds wonderful.  Hurry up and eat, Alphonse, it’s movie night!”

Al laughs, his cheeks just a bit pink. “Okay, okay, I’m trying!”

It’s not until Al wheels his chair away with May and turns around to tell Edward and Winry “You two have fun together”, with a knowing look of his own, that Ed realizes that maybe he and Winry aren’t the only ones thinking of matchmaking this evening.  But when the two of them go back to the Elric apartment for some hot chocolate and video games, he thinks begrudgingly that Al is quite right, and (especially when Winry smiles at him) he is so, _so_ screwed.

~

It’s late at night, dark and stormy.  The waves are high and choppy and the winds whip their hair out behind them as they stand, watching the sea from the balcony of the apartment.

“Boys?  You should come inside,” Winry calls from behind them.  Edward doesn’t respond, gritting his teeth against the spray as the gusts pick up.  It’s dark, stormy, and late, and somewhere out in those black waters, there’s a kaiju.  Dragon’s Pulse is out there fighting, a few miles north of their base.  Ice Queen is on standby to back them up should it be necessary, and Glimmering Mountain can always suit up and follow them out if they still need help, but there’s still an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach at his vulnerability.  He and Al are stuck here, not in Fullmetal’s cockpit, unable to fight off any giant monsters that try to kill them.

“I don’t like this,” Al mutters, barely audible over the storm.

“Me neither,” Ed tells him, looking away from the waves to glance down at his brother, holding his crutches as he sits in one of the two chairs by the balcony table.  There’s an odd feeling of hopelessness in knowing that something you’re normally able to fight could kill you with the blink of an eye now, even though he knows realistically that at the compound, they’re safe as they can be.  Sure, they _should_ be inside, on the lower floors, further from the side of the building facing the shore, but honestly?  If a kaiju makes it into the base, it won’t matter what part of the building they’re in.  So here they stay.

“I feel so _useless_ ,” Al continues.  When Ed looks at him more closely, he sees the other boy’s fingers clutching the crutches so tight his knuckles are white.  “We can’t go out there.”

“Yeah,” Ed says.  He’s not watching the storm anymore; he’s watching his brother.  Al’s still staring out to sea hollowly, like he’s not really seeing it at all.  The flood of hopelessness ebbs away and is replaced by a rising tide of protectiveness—it’s one thing if Ed feels weirdly numb and despairing and upset, but it’s different if Al is, too.  Al being sad and hurting sets off those alarm bells in Ed’s mind.  “Penny for your thoughts?”

There’s a short pause before he gets an answer.  “I don’t know.  I’m sick of limping around like this.”  Al blows out a breath, exasperated, miserable.  “I hate that it’s been so long and I still can’t even walk properly.  I hate that my arms hurt and I hate crutches and I hate us being stuck like this!”

“Al...”

“Edward!  Alphonse!  Come on, come inside, let’s close this door and stop letting all the rain in,” Winry calls again, her voice more taut.  Of the three of them, Ed supposes that she’s probably the most afraid of the kaiju.  She’s never gone head to head with one, never beaten one into submission, never known what it’s like to be able to fight them off.  All her life, she’s had to run.  In a way, maybe that’s better than having known what it’s like, to not have to run, and then being unable to do anything but that.

“One minute!” Al calls back to her, then clenches a fist and slams it against the armrest of his chair.  “Brother,” he says, staring out at the water again, unflinching as another gale blows rain into their faces, “I’m so tired of being the reason you’re trapped out here, unable to go out and _do_ something.  I know you hate that.  I’m sorry that it’s because of me—”

“Al, if you think I’m mad at you for this, you’re a complete and utter fucking idiot,” Edward cuts him off mid-apology.  He pushes away from the railing and steps behind his little brother’s chair, places his hands on Al’s shoulders, and leans down to press a kiss to the top of Al’s damp head, the easiest way he can think of to clumsily say everything that he wants to say.  “C’mon.  Let’s go inside.”

He waits as Al clambers to his feet, and then leads the way inside, closing the door behind both of them.  When he slides the curtains over it and turns around, the living room is warmly lit, a direct contrast to the cold darkness outside, and Winry’s waiting with twin mugs of something hot.  He reaches for one, but she pulls away and frowns at him.

“Dry clothes before you settle down,” she tuts disapprovingly.  “Both of you!  I’m not watching you guys get sick because you just had to watch a rainstorm.”  _And look for kaiju_ goes unsaid.  No one acknowledges it.

Normally, Ed figures he’d grumble and argue, but something about how it’s half past two in the morning and he’s feeling kind of sad and Al’s definitely feeling sad makes him stop.  He just nods and shuffles off to his room, assuming Al’s doing the same, and changes into some sweatpants and an old T-shirt and hoodie, dumping the wet clothes on the floor to deal with later.  Then he goes back to the living room and flops down onto the couch.

Winry sits down next to him and presses a mug into his hand.  It’s just shy of scalding when he takes a swig—hot cocoa, _that’s_ what it is—but he does his best not to make his immediate regret obvious and swallows it to avoid swallowing his pride.  “Thanks,” he chokes out.

“You’re welcome,” she says, amusement in her voice because she is not fooled.  Of course she’s not.  Of course.  She’s Winry, he can never fool her, and it sucks.

Luckily, before he can come up with a way to deny the accusation that he just burned his tongue without outright saying that she accused him of burning his tongue, she settles back against the cushions with a little sigh, leaning against his side.  She’s warm—obviously, because she’s been inside and not in the cold wind and rain—and her hand slides over and finds its way to rest on his knee, and his brain stops in its tracks.  Forget accusations and hot cocoa problems, this is pretty nice.

“Are you guys okay?” she asks him quietly.  “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”  He looks away, at the other mug waiting for Al to claim it.  Telling her would only worry her more, and he doesn’t want her to worry.  Besides, there’s nothing she can do to make them stop feeling helpless because Al’s hurt.  And yeah, theoretically Ed himself could drift with someone else and go fight, but there’s no way in _hell_ he’s leaving Al alone on the shore, defenseless.

“Ed.”  That’s Winry’s no-nonsense voice.  Well, good for her, he can be stubborn too!

“It’s nothing,” he says again.  “Don’t worry about it.”

“Edward, I’m serious!” She pulls away to look him in the eye, frowning.  “I can’t help you if you keep shutting me out, and I’m _sick_ of you shutting me out!  What’s wrong?”

And maybe it’s because it’s half past two in the morning and he’s too tired for a real argument about something like this, he blows out a breath and puts his mug down on the armrest, keeping a hand on the handle so it doesn’t fall, and says, “Fine.  You wanna know what’s wrong?  Okay.  I’ll tell you.  What’s wrong is, we’re stuck out of our jaeger and Al is beating himself up about the fact that we’re so helpless and we can’t help our friends and I’m not so happy about the fact that he’s mad at himself for having a broken leg.  And I didn’t want to tell you because there’s literally nothing you can do to make his leg heal faster, and I’m pretty sure that knowing he’s upset because his leg is broken didn’t help you at all.  But whatever.  You happy now?”

Winry is quiet for a second; then, she scoots back in and settles herself against his side again, this time twisting around a bit so she can slide one arm gently across his waist and lay her head against his shoulder. “I’m sorry,” she says softly.  “I’m sorry you’re both hurting.  But I _am_ glad you told me.”

“Why?” he asks disbelievingly, the scathing bite in his voice tempered by the way he lays his cheek against her hair.  It’s soft to the touch, and he feels some of the fight draining out of him.

“Because,” she explains gently, more gently than he’s used to her being, “at least now I don’t have ten thousand things that _could_ be it going through my head.  Now I know what it is.  And no, I can’t make his leg heal faster, but at least you guys don’t have to deal with it alone, okay?”

Edward turns that over in his mind a few times.  Then he shrugs slightly. “Whatever,” he grumbles. “I’m too tired to argue with you about this.”

She doesn’t say _well then go to sleep_ , for which he’s grateful.  But then again, he supposes that she knows all too well the way that you can’t sleep when your friends are out in a jaeger.

“Good,” she says instead, quietly.  “You boys can be ridiculous.  I’m glad you’re being at least _kind of_ reasonable for once,” and she lifts her head and presses a soft kiss to his cheek.  Then she withdraws and says, “I’m gonna go check on Al, see if he wants his hot cocoa or not.  You can just sit there, I’ll be right back.”

And as she walks away, Ed finds himself smiling.

~

“So,” Ed says lazily, slouching against the armrest of the futon in Winry’s workroom, “you heard about this base-wide Christmas party thing yet?  Al’s all excited about it, he joined the Secret Santa and everything.”

“What,” Winry’s voice echoes from behind the Jaeger finger poking in from the hangar bay, “you mean you _didn’t_?  Ed, you humbug!”  Something clangs and she mutters under her breath, her hand appearing and groping around until she snags a pair of pliers on the floor.  She’s fine-tuning one of the motors in Ice Queen’s hand; since her workroom is on the seventh floor, the jaeger is kneeling in the bay so that it can reach into here.  It’s kind of funny to see, honestly, but Winry pointed out that moving a jaeger’s arm is a lot less effort than building all the scaffolding required to reach its hand, so here it is.  And here she is, lying under it on her back on a rolling board so she can reach circuits and stuff down there.  Or something like that.  He’s kind of fuzzy on the details.

“Please,” he scoffs, linking his hands behind his head and leaning back indolently.  “We’ve all known I don’t do Christmas parties for years.”

“You did last year when Riza invited you to the one she and Roy threw,” she points out.

“That’s because, first of all, Hawkeye is scary as _fuck_ when she wants to be and I don’t wanna get on her bad side, and second, I figured attending her and the Bastard’s party wouldn’t be as bad as some kind of giant thing like this year’s affair is shaping up to be.  Also, Al dragged me.”  He waves a finger at her to emphasize his point.

“Sure, sure,” Winry teases, “blame it all on the guy who isn’t here.”  She pushes herself a bit further under the hand; he sees her feet slide further out of view as she does so.

“It’s not handing off blame, it’s the _truth_!” Ed defends.  “He made me go. You know how he is, he gets excited about stuff and then wants you to go with him and if you don’t he gets that sad look, you know the one, he looks like a goddamn kicked puppy, and then you gotta go.”

“Aww, you big softie!  Can’t say no to your little brother!”  Winry laughs, the sound metallic and echoey from under Ice Queen’s hand.

Ed sits up and frowns at her even though he knows she can’t see him.  “What, you’re telling me you _can_ say no to him when he makes that face?   Sheesh, Winry, you’re even more heartless than I thought!”

“I didn’t say that!” she protests, laughing again.  “All I said was that Al’s got you wrapped around his little finger!”

“Yeah, same way Ice Queen’s got you wrapped around hers,” Ed snorts.

Winry rolls out from under the jaeger’s hand to toss a screw at his forehead.  He sees it coming, catches it triumphantly, and tosses it back to her, and she rolls back under again.  A companionable silence falls between them, during which Winry tinkers away at the worn motors and Edward stares at the ceiling and thinks about last year’s Christmas party when Hughes had tossed a sprig of mistletoe over Hawkeye and Mustang’s heads and Mustang had gone red in the face and nearly thrown a lit candle at him.  That moment alone had been funny enough that he figures the entire party was worthwhile.

“So,” Winry pipes up, breaking the silence.  “Are you going to the party this year?  You make it sound like you aren’t.”

“I dunno,” he shrugs.  And it’s true, he doesn’t know.  He kind of wants to avoid it and just have a quiet celebration with the people he cares about most—he has presents for Al and Winry already picked out—but if they’re all at the party themselves, there’s no point in him sitting alone being grumpy.  He may as well go to the party and do that.  (That’s what you’re supposed to at parties, that’s how that works.  That’s totally how that works, right?)  “Are you?”

“Of course!” she chirps eagerly.  “I signed up for the Secret Santa, too!  Actually—since you didn’t sign up, I can tell you this—“ she drops her voice a bit “—I got Al.  And you wanna guess what I’m getting him?”

“It had better not be more tea,” Edward grouses.  “He loves all the ones you got him for his birthday, so much that he wants to hoard them all and they’re _still_ sitting in the cabinet, taking up all that space I could be using for coffee.”

Winry laughs.  “It’s not tea,” she says. “If I hadn’t already asked you your opinion on it a few months ago I’d say you’d hate it more than the tea, except for how much it’d make Al smile.”

“Hey, there’s no need to get so cryptic,” he complains, thinking back on what she might have asked him about over the past few months.  What would Winry even give Al as a present?  A poster of jaeger schematics?  No, that wouldn’t annoy him.  More chemistry and biology books?  Those wouldn’t be annoying either, unless Al took ages to read them and Ed had to wait forever to borrow them to read for himself.  What could it be...?

Oh.

_Oh._

“Oh my god,” he says out loud.

“Figured it out?” Winry asks, a sly note in her voice.

“You did _not_ get him a cat,” he says disbelievingly.

“Well, no, not yet.  I wanted to run it by you again to make sure you’re okay with living with one,” she amends, then rolls out from under Ice Queen’s hand again to prop herself up on her elbow and look at him questioningly.  “You _are_ okay with it, right?  I found an adorable kitten at one of the animal shelters in town, he’s house-trained and everything, and I just _know_ Al would fall in love with him...”

“Al would fall in love with literally any cat you threw at him, even an angry old bitter tom wandering on the streets,” Ed points out.  Truthfully.  Because that last has happened, and Edward still remembers the angry red scratches on his then-ten-year-old brother’s skin.

“Okay, fair,” she concedes with a rueful grin, no doubt recalling the same incident.  “But you haven’t answered the question!  Would you mind?”

Edward blows out a breath.  Would he mind?  He thinks about it for a second, considers having to remember to feed and take care of a pet, and then figures that honestly it can’t be that different from having to feed and take care of a little brother.  Really, what’s the difference, Al and a cat?  “Nah, I wouldn’t mind,” he says.  “Go for it.”

“Yes!” Winry crows.  “I can’t wait to see his face when he gets his present.  Too bad the party’s so far away... Oh, Ed, say you’ll come!  You have to be there to meet the kitten, too!”  She turns big imploring blue eyes on him, and he fidgets, looking at the ceiling again to avoid meeting her gaze.

“I don’t _have_ to,” he wheedles. “I can always meet it afterwards...”

“But it’ll be so much more fun if you do come,” she says, sounding distinctly dissatisfied.  “There’ll be good food, and music, and dancing, and games, and all that!  Plus, we could probably arrange for Al and May to bump into each other under some mistletoe,” she adds, waggling her eyebrows and laughing.

Edward, who is definitely not thinking of a different couple meeting under the mistletoe (himself and Winry?  What?  No, that’s _definitely_ not what he’s thinking about, what put that idea in your head?), snorts.  “Okay, I admit, that would be kind of funny.”

“So you’ll come?” she latches on immediately, hopeful.

“I didn’t say that!”

“Well then what _are_ you saying?  Answer the question, will you?”

“I’m _thinking_ about it!”  He huffs, crossing his arms.  “Maybe if you keep nagging me, I won’t go at all.”

He gets another screw thrown at his head for his troubles, and because he’s staring at the ceiling he doesn’t see this one coming fast enough to catch it. It bounces off his hair instead.

“Oh, you are so infuriating, d’you know that?”  Winry’s voice is suddenly much closer than before, and when he blinks and looks back at her she’s kneeling by the couch and looking down at him with her hands on her hips.  “I was gonna do this at the party, with a convenient excuse, but if you’re not going, I’m sick of skirting around it so I may as well do it now.”

“Winry, what—“

And then her hands are cupping his cheeks and she’s _very_ close and holy shit Winry Rockbell is kissing him, her lips are on his and he’s so stunned it takes him a second to kiss her back, and a second longer for his arms to come uncrossed and to clumsily wind their way around her waist.  By that point, she’s already pulling back, cheeks heavily dusted with pink.

“There, you dummy,” she says.  “I’ve been waiting to do that for months, actually.”

“Shoulda done it sooner,” Ed tells her, still riding on a wave of euphoria that means he doesn’t hesitate before he pulls her back in and kisses her.  And holy shit he’s kissing Winry Rockbell, and this has not stopped being absolutely breathtaking and amazing in the last five or ten seconds, nope, he might need to keep going over and over again, for science, obviously, to see how long until it stops sending sparks through him from head to toe.

This time when they break apart Winry gives him a light shove.  “Scoot over!  You’re taking up the whole seat.”  When he obligingly makes room, she sits down and leans against his side, her thumb stroking over his cheek again.  Then she starts to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” he demands, kind of self-consciously.  She shakes her head, still laughing, and buries her face in her hands.

After a second she lifts her head, still blushing furiously (not that he’s faring much better; his face feels like its on fire and he has a feeling he’s as crimson as his favorite hoodie again).  “I can’t believe I just did that!”  And she dissolves into another bout of helpless laughter, slumping back against him and the couch cushions.

“Yeah, well, that makes two of us,” Ed tells her dryly.  He starts laughing, too, though, and when they finally quiet down he slowly sits up and tentatively slides an arm around her waist, glancing at her questioningly to make sure that’s alright.  She gives him a radiant smile in response, and then her phone buzzes in her pocket.

“Oh,” she says, starting to reach for it. Then she pauses, noting the motor oil on her hand, and wipes it off on her shirt before she touches the phone.  Looking at the screen she says, “It’s May.  She and Al are going downtown for some tea and want to know if we’d like to join?”

Ed laughs.  “What, they’re inviting us along on their date?”

“Apparently,” Winry laughs too.  Then she grins, eyes twinkling.  “Well, we could always say it’s a double date, hm?”

And just like that he feels himself blush scarlet again.  But he nods, grinning back at her. “Yeah.  Yeah, we could.”

“Well?”  She looks at him, eyebrows raised.  “I’m assuming wherever we go you’ll get coffee, but going out for coffee doesn’t sound like a bad first date to me!”

“Hah, yeah, sounds... sounds pretty good to me, too,” he agrees, a bit dazed because _he’s going on a date with Winry Rockbell_. 

But his brain catches up to reality after a second and he realizes she’s standing so he jumps to his feet, too, checking his pockets out of habit to make sure he has his wallet and phone and keys on him.  They’re all there, good; he pulls out his phone and checks to make sure there’s no messages.  There is one, from Al.  He opens it and sees a YouTube link.  When the page has loaded enough to say the word “cat” in the title bar, he closes it again and stuffs his phone back into his pocket, shaking his head, and looks for Winry.

She’s rummaging around in the pile of miscellaneous blankets and jackets for her favorite winter coat; once she’s found it and put it on, Edward focuses his eyes on the door and grabs her hand as nonchalantly as he can.  “Let’s go?”

“Yeah!” she agrees, squeezing his hand.

Al and May are waiting for them near the exit closest to the residential section of the compound. When Ed and Winry approach, still holding hands, the two of them exchange glances, eyebrows raised high.

“Hi,” Ed says.  “We going?”

“There’s motor oil on your cheek,” Al says instead of answering, grinning like the cat with the cream.

“What?”  He recalls then how Winry had had oil on her hand, had wiped it off before touching her phone... _had touched his face with that hand_.  “Winry!”

Winry laughs at his indignance.  “Oh, don’t look like that,” she says lightly.  “It just lets everyone know you’re mine!”  She punctuates her words with a kiss to his cheek, presumably just below the oil smear.

“Oh, trust me, we knew that already,” Al tells them both, still grinning.  “I’m just glad you both figured it out, too.”

“Took you long enough!” May adds, shaking her head at them.  She’s grinning too, though, a big happy smile instead of Al’s teasing glee.  “Any longer and we would all have been placing bets!”

“Well, that’s your own financial stupidity talking, not my fault,” Edward grouses.  “Bet all you want, it’s not my problem!”

“Oh, hush,” Winry says. “Let’s just go get our tea and you can worry about how you’re going to disappoint everyone who wanted to gamble on your love life later, hm?”

“Fine.  Whatever.”

They’re all laughing as they set out for downtown.

~

Between Al and Winry, there’s no way Ed can get out of going to the damn Christmas party.  But as far as parties go, it’s not bad at all.  It’s a potluck; Winry and Al get excited and make a mess in the kitchen in the process of throwing together their apple pie while Ed sneaks some apples and cinnamon sauce.  Mrs. Gracia brings a beautiful, delicious, heavenly spinach casserole, and between that and the hot spiced apple cider, the food table might just be Edward’s favorite part of the room.

And when Al opens the box with totally-not-suspicious air holes poked through the top and sides to discover the white kitten he promptly dubs Snowball, Edward is forced to admit to Winry that she was right and that it was definitely worth coming just to see his face light up like that.  It’s been a while since Al had something to take his mind off the crutches and the kaiju for so long.

“It was a great idea,” Ed tells her, watching Al coo at Snowball as he excitedly shows him to May.  “Thanks.”

Her fingers twine themselves with his as she sips her hot chocolate.  “You’re welcome.”

They stand there together in silence for a moment, listening to strains of “Sleigh Ride” drifting around the room as people talk and laugh and dance and cheer.  Off in that corner, Izumi and Sig share some of the apple pie, while nearby the Armstrong siblings are all talking amongst themselves about something or other.  Al leans on May, stroking Snowball’s ears and being oblivious to the tender way she looks at him; Edward and Winry, however, both notice it and exchange glances.  Jeez, Ed thinks.  Al’s _terrible_ at noticing his own love life.

“Okay, you might have been right,” Edward says to her quietly, a few moments later.  “This party’s not that bad.”

“Mm, I told you it’d be fun,” Winry nods.  “And you know what’ll make it even better?”

“What?”

“Look up,” she says, her eyes shining.  He does and sees a sprig of green, looking back to Winry with a little grin.  She smiles back and leans in as she murmurs, “We’re standing under the mistletoe."

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> AN: Okay WOW was this fun to write! Fun fact, it currently sits at over three times the length I originally planned for it to be. 
> 
> Some fun facts that didn't make it into the actual fic: "Glimmering Mountain" is the jaeger piloted by Sig and Alex Armstrong. Because together, they are the shiny, sparkly Unmovable Object. And then from there I got Ice Queen, which is the deadly combination of Izumi and Olivier Armstrong. They are more or less the complementary Unstoppable Force. 
> 
> Roy and Riza are drift compatible, but they consider themselves retired from active duty and now serve more executive roles. Maes works in the intel and science department.
> 
> The reason Ed and Al ended up in the program so young (I put them as entering it about a year younger than Raleigh and Yancy were in the film) is that their mother died and they had nowhere else to turn; Winry is still their childhood friend, but this time, she came along on their adventure. Their jaeger Fullmetal looks like Al's armor.
> 
> That's more or less all (this is a lie, I have so many more things I could say that I could write a multichapter fic for this au), so I'll leave it there! Happy Holidays, everyone! :D


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